British actress Rebecca Hall is so well-versed in the history of Hollywood that when she read the script for “Closed Circuit,” she immediately saw a connection to the twisty, political thrillers she grew up loving.

“First off, I thought, ‘Closed Circuit’ was a great story and then, secondly, I loved that it had the flavor of those conspiracy films that were made in the U.S. in the 1970s,” she said. “I also thought that no one’s made a paranoia thriller set in London and it is the very right place for it.”

“Closed Circuit” might resemble a ’70s flicks like “The Parallax View” and “Three Days of the Condor” but if Hall was casting another actress to play her role, she’d reach back to Hollywood’s Golden Age.

“Who would I see playing this character? It would probably be Katharine Hepburn, wouldn’t it?” said Hall, 31, citing Hepburn, Barbara Stanwyck and Bette Davis as her three of her favorite actors.

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Directed by John Crowley, “Closed Circuit” revolves around the case of Farroukh Erdogan (Denis Moschitto), a suspected terrorist on trial for an explosion that decimates a London market.

Since the government must use classified evidence to prosecute Erdogan, the Attorney General (Jim Broadbent) appoints a Special Advocate named Claudia Simmons-Howe (Hall) as part of the defense team. Claudia is allowed to see the classified evidence — and can argue for its full disclosure during a “closed session”— but she’s not allowed to communicate with the defendant or with other members of the defense team.

Making the proceedings even more fraught with tension is the appearance of Martin Rose (Eric Bana) at the defense table. Not only is Martin a former lover of Claudia’s but, as he digs deeper into the case, he uncovers the outlines of a sinister conspiracy.

“It’s good fun to play someone who is morally righteous and compromised at the same time,” Hall said of her character. “There’s an interesting tension there, and frankly there’s something really appealing about playing characters who are quite defined by what they do, in the sense that barristers tend to be, without making horrible sweeping generalizations.

“ tend to be quite articulate their emotions compartmentalized because they’re used to analyzing what they’re feeling and putting it into the form of arguments. That’s an interesting tension, and it’s fun to play.”

Hall found much of what’s goes on in “Closed Circuit” very timely, especially in the wake of whistle-blower Edward Snowden’s revelations about the NSA’s spying policies.

“ is the question that we’re all sort of facing now in this post-Snowden time, as all of these things are coming out,” noted the actress.

“It’s one thing to be idealistic about civil liberties also live in a state that secure and all the rest of it. How do you balance those two, perhaps mutually exclusive, concepts?”

“Closed Circuit” is more interested in raising questions than answering them - and that’s just the way Hall likes it.

“I love films where there are so many grey areas and there’s no redemption,” Hall said. “That’s fabulous to me. I think, in movies especially, it’s not often that filmmakers are allowed to make films that don’t tie everything up neatly with a bow at the end of it and say, ‘This is what you’re meant to think.’”

Hall comes by her love of challenging material naturally. Her father, Peter Hall, is a stage director and founder of the Royal Shakespeare Company, and her mother, Maria Ewing, is an opera singer.

Growing up, the actress said her Dad never gave her advice encouraging or discouraging her love of show business.

“My father has the remarkable capacity to utterly be lacking in any condescension so he would never tell me anything,” Hall said. “He would always let me work it out for myself. He’s very open like that and he raised me without ever telling me neat maxims for a life in the theater.”

Hall got her big break in 2002 when she appeared in her father’s production of “Mrs. Warren’s Profession.” Since then, she’s successfully aced roles in film and TV. She’s run the gamut from “Iron Man 3” to Woody Allen’s “Vicky Cristina Barcelona” to “The Town”with Ben Affleck. On TV, she recently starred in the acclaimed HBO mini-series “Parade’s End” with Benedict Cumberbatch.

Ten years into her acting career, Hall admits that the toughest part of what she does is unearthing interesting characters to play.

“It’s difficult to find roles which are three-dimensional,” she said. “I think there’s a terribly reductive notion that writing a strong woman means writing a woman that always does the right thing, and I think that’s unfair because we’re complex beings, every bit as complex as men.

“ should write roles for women who make mistakes and who can be ugly and who can be complicated and compromising. I wish there was more of that.”

At the moment, Hall is filming “Transcendence,” a sci-fi film about a scientist who uploads her late husband’s brain into a computer after he is assassinated by terrorists. Together, the pair attempts to develop a computer that can transcend the abilities of the human brain. Johnny Depp and Morgan Freeman co-star.

“I’m not allowed to talk about ‘Transcendence’ but it deals a lot with issues about the advance of technology. You can’t stop it. That’s the truth of it, and what we think of as scary and dangerous now will be normal . Once upon a time, we were apes and now we’re interfacing with small glowing boxes.”

Also, still to come from Hall is Patrice Leconte’s romantic drama “The Promise,” which co-stars Richard Madden (“Game of Thrones”) and Alan Rickman. The film will be released in 2014.

And then there’s “Machinal,” which marks Hall’s Broadway debut. The rarely-revived show, bowing in December, is based on the life of real-life murderess Ruth Snyder, who was executed in 1928.

Hall loves to be tested and “Machinal” is likely to provide her with a whooper of challenge.

“It’s intriguing to me because it’s every bit as a good as Samuel Beckett,” she said. “It’s very confronting. It’s very abstract. It’s very political. It’s not the thing you’re used to seeing on a Broadway stage, so that will be interesting.”